Drafts of two memos reported on Sunday by the McClatchy news organization and allegedly also seen by Reuters show that the Trump administration intends to expand the kind of immigrants that immigration agents can target for deportation. A couple of sources have told Reuters that the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security has approved the plans, which are expected to be given to Customs and Border Protection and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) this week.
The orders could result in hundreds of thousands of immigrants facing expedited deportation proceedings, including many who were not priorities for removal under President Barack Obama’s administration. The memos are intended as guidance to give instruction to field agents on how to implement the two executive orders signed on 25 January by President Donald Trump. These are intended to force undocumented immigrants to leave the US and to deter more from arriving.
One of the memos instructs ICE agents to ignore the memos issued by President Obama on immigration priorities, which targeted only convicted criminals and recent immigrant arrivals for deportation, and instead to prioritize undocumented immigrants who may have been charged with criminal offenses but not yet convicted.
ICE agents would also be given a wide degree of discretion in making decisions about who should and should not be deported, with all undocumented immigrants subject to removal. The memos do, though, show that Obama’s 2012 deferred action program is likely to remain in place.